Don't try these on the highway: really distracting driving behaviors

Just about everybody does
something else while they're driving. In a study performed by the University of
North Carolina for the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, researchers put surveillance
cameras in the cars of 70 volunteers and tracked what drivers did while they were
behind the wheel -- besides drive, that is.

The top activity,
at 97.1 percent, was reaching or leaning over to find things, followed closely
by fiddling with the radio.

After that came talking to other
people in the car, which was reported separately from "dealing with passengers"
(i.e., threatening to turn the car around and go home). Just over 71 percent of
the volunteers ate or drank while driving.

Then they moved
into the more unsettling activities: 45.7 percent participated in "grooming"
activities, such as brushing their hair, applying make-up or shaving, and 40 percent
read or wrote while driving.

Only 30 percent of the
volunteers talked on a cell phone while driving; 7.1 percent smoked.

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While all of these things are riveting, Bankrate.com decided to
conduct its own completely unscientific study, consisting entirely of asking
people we knew to pass along stupid driving behaviors they had witnessed. In
rare instances, the person reporting the behavior admitted to being the person
who had engaged in it.

Bankrate.com does not condone or endorse driving while performing
any of these activities, all of which, for the record, are really bad ideas.